


This Is Where We Both Belong (Many, Many Miles From Home)

by verbaepulchellae



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: 500 word challenges, F/M, Fake Marriage, Fluff, March Flash fic, Prompt: Hands, Smut, Sneaking Around, Tumblr Fic, season four speculation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-26
Updated: 2016-10-04
Packaged: 2018-05-23 07:16:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 17,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6109153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verbaepulchellae/pseuds/verbaepulchellae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One-shots, prompt fills and other tumblr drabbles that I'm finally getting around to posting!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hands

**Author's Note:**

> 3rd Place in February Flash Fic Contest

“Give me your hand.”

“A please would be nice,” Clarke says absently, not bothering to open her eyes. 

They’ve hiked all morning, nowhere to go but it’s an excuse to be alone, a chance to be together away from prying eyes. There is no privacy at Arkadia, only corners to hide around, doors to shut temporarily against the endless activity. Out here, there’s only the sound of cicadas, the rustle of summer wind through pines, the sent of wildflowers. Out here, it’s Bellamy’s presence at her back and his voice light and easy with his stories, his warm smile when she looks at him.

He huffs out a breath. “Give me your hand, please.” 

Clarke stretches her arms overhead, bumps her hands into his thigh and tilts her head back to she can look at him. “No handcuffs,” she teases and he shoots her a disparaging look.

“One time. It was one time, Clarke,” he says, as he gently takes her right wrist in his large hand and props it up on his thigh. Clarke closes her eyes again. They’re in a small field, more a break in the woods than anything else, but there’s soft grass to lie on and the warm sun on her face makes Clarke lazy. Bellamy hums quietly and she feels him slip something around her wrist, rough fingers working delicately as they fasten it. He brushes his fingertips up her palm as he takes his hand away.

Clarke lifts her wrist over her face to look at what he’s given her. It’s a small bracelet, several different colors of fabric woven intricately together and crude little metal beads interspaced. 

“Did you make this?” Clarke asks as Bellamy shifts so he can lie down next to her, propping his chin up in his hand. He reaches out and touches the bracelet, touches the soft skin of her inner wrist.

“Red is from what’s left of the drop ship seatbelts,” he says softly. “The blue is for your eyes, the black is from my guards jacket.” He glances at her face furtively, uncertain and she smiles at him, turning on her side so they’re lying face to face. Bellamy drops his hand and settles his head comfortably on the grass so they can look at each other more easily.

“And the beads?” Clarke prompts. 

“The beads,” Bellamy says with a smile, warming to his explanation. “The beads are for every time we’ve found each other again.” He encircles her wrist and brings it to his mouth, pressing his lips to the pulse point there. 

“I see,” Clarke says, smiling, and strokes her fingers over Bellamy’s cheek, tracing his freckles. “But how will everyone know you belong to me as well?”

Bellamy grins and props his left hand up for Clarke to see. The little red, black and blue bracelet looks delicate on his large wrist, but when Clarke slips her finger under it and tugs, testing, the fabric and weave hold strong.


	2. Merrily, Merrily, Merrily

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Come on, Clarke. You gotta learn.”
> 
> “I don’t, actually.” Clarke crosses her arms over her chest, feet evenly spread, grounded. She returns Bellamy’s glare until he breaks it, shaking his head and strips his shirt over his head. He drops it without any pretense and bends to roll up his pant legs all the way to the knee.
> 
> Bellamy teaches Clarke to swim

“Come on, Clarke. You gotta learn.”

“I don’t, actually.” Clarke crosses her arms over her chest, feet evenly spread, grounded. She returns Bellamy’s glare until he breaks it, shaking his head and strips his shirt over his head. He drops it without any pretense and bends to roll up his pant legs all the way to the knee. When he straightens, Clarke still hasn’t budged at all. Sometimes it works, ignoring her stubbornness until she gives in because she doesn’t have to give up, sometimes it doesn’t.

“Listen,” he says, dropping his voice low and trying a different approach. “It’s fun. And safe. And I’m right here, you’ll be fine.”

“I’m not scared, Bellamy,” Clarke snaps although they both know it’s a lie. Ever since Clarke told him, sitting close together in front of the fire and sharing a meagre fish between them, Bellamy can’t forget it. The way her eyes glazed over a bit, the way her breath stalled out before she reminded herself to keep breathing. Nearly being drowned twice would do that to you. He’s certainly not lining up for any more radiation cleansing. But Clarke is nothing if not a fighter and that she fears this makes him incredibly sad, because there’s so much good that comes with water. “I just don’t see the point of learning to swim if I don’t ever plan on going swimming.”

“Clarke, if I told you I had a new guard who didn’t plan on learning to shoot a gun because she never thought we would need to defend ourselves again what would you do?”

“That’s entirely different.”

“Not if you ever fall in the water that’s too deep to stand, it’s not. Not if we ever have another reason to go see Luna, it’s not. Stop being ridiculous.”

“You’re the one being ridiculous,” Clarke mutters and Bellamy half throws his arms up because he knows that they’ll go around and around and around until they’re both actually pissed at each other, and it’s way too hot for that today.

“Alright, alright, fine,” Bellamy says. “Sit and suffer, but I’m going in.” He turns his back on her and wades into the water until he’s waist deep and then dives under. The water is refreshing after the muggy heat, cool and clean after he’s been covered in sweat for the past three days. They never had anything like this on the Ark; water was rationed and shower water allotted for two people and shared between three meant Bellamy had never gotten to indulge in the pleasure of getting clean before. He swims every chance he gets now. 

He does a few laps in the small river basin he and Octavia had discovered, doesn’t look at Clarke still sitting on the shore until his chest is heaving and he paddles back to the shallows to catch his breath. Clarke is watching him, chin on her drawn up knees, cheeks flushed from the heat and hair sticking to her forehead. Bellamy resists the urge to splash her. 

“When did you learn?” Clarke asks when he’s basking half in the water and on the shore, close enough to her to be companionable.

“While you were gone,” he tells her, stretching his arms over head. “At the end of the day, there wasn’t much to do and your mom and Kane were pretty lax about us being beyond the walls as long as we were back before dark. It was nice.”

“Sounds like it,” Clarke says, closer, and when Bellamy opens his eyes, she’s scooched down the shore and is dipping her toes in the water. She’s rolled her pants up like he has, exposing the soft, fine blonde hair on her legs. Bellamy’s mouth goes a little dry but he ignores it and instead scoops up some water in his hand and gently lets it trickle down Clarke’s calves. Her hair darkens and sticks to her legs in the water droplets and Bellamy turns his head away, doesn’t think about licking the water off her. “I can’t remember feeling like that. Like, the last time I felt that things were really going to be okay. Even now...”

Bellamy scoops up more water and lets it trickle down her other leg. “You can’t give up on me now, Clarke,” he says quietly. “There’s shit to come, but, you and me? We always work it out, don’t we?”

Clarke nods slowly, extends her legs and lets the water lap up to her knees as she stretches them out flat in front of her. “In the end,” she agrees.

“Better than never,” Bellamy says gruffly. 

“So how’d you learn?” Clarke asks, shaking herself. “To swim.”

“Octavia and…” his throat tightens and Bellamy grimaces, fights down the sickening feeling of guilt that he doesn’t think is ever going to stop making him feel nauseous. “Lincoln.”

The birds trill in the trees and the water makes a soothing sound on the pebbles of their little beach. The stillness of summer heat without wind can feel threateningly stifling but when Clarke puts her hand on his shoulder, Bellamy can breath again.

“Ok,” she says softly, eyes flickering across his face. “Teach me.”

She wades into the water with Bellamy. Clarke’s alright as long as she can stand, but when Bellamy kicks off and floats, Clarke stalls, face going hard and grim and he comes back to her. “Slowly,” he reminds her. He talks Clarke through sinking down until she’s submerged up to her shoulders, makes some stupid joke that makes her look like she can’t decide if she wants to scold him or laugh. He touches the small of her back, takes the back of her head in his palm and gently urges her back until she’s floating, hair spreading out in the rippling water around her head. 

When he looks down into her face, the blind panic she’s fighting against nearly undoes him, but then he sees the trust there too, the soft gleaming of faith and absolute belief in him that’s always overcome whatever doubts he’s harbored. There’s that soft flicker of something deeper and more real there as well, the one that strikes a chord in his chest: that something neither of them can bring themselves to acknowledge yet.

“See?” He asks her softly instead, still holding the back of her head. “See? You’re a natural.”

She curls trembling fingers around his wrist and smiles just a bit. “It’s nice,” she says just as soft. “Better than sweating.”

“Told you,” Bellamy teases her and then carefully lifts her up so she can regain her balance. “Ok, you’re good. That was a good first step.”

Clarke takes a breath and nods, looking determined. “What’s next?”

“Why rush?” Bellamy asks, paddling around her, making her turn in place to watch him, wet shirt sticking to her. “We’ve got all summer. We can take our time.” He dips under water and blows bubbles through his nose until she’s laughing and then follows her back to shore, splashing water at her back so that she’s swearing at him. They stretch out on the shore, side by side, and Bellamy falls asleep in the sun, reveling in the warmth on his skin and the slowly growing glow in his chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	3. Banter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mego42 requested: bellarke banter for "500 word prompt fills"

“I think you’ve gotten it all,” Clarke says, leaning on the Ark’s wall next to where Bellamy sits, carefully cleaning the pieces of his rifle. “You’ve conquered the dirt, Bellamy.”

“Excuse me? Do I advise you on how to suture your patients?” Bellamy asks without rancor. “No.”

“That’s because needles are too delicate for your large fingers,” Clarke informs him as she slides down the wall to sit next to him and picks up one of the greased rags Bellamy’s been using. “And blood makes you squirm.”

“I’ll have you know I’m damn good with a needle,” Bellamy says glancing at her and then handing her the pistol resting next to him, double checking that it’s fully discharged as he does. “And normal people don’t like blood.”

“Normal people don’t brood and over-clean their weapons,” Clarke says as she dismantles the pistol with minimal fumbling. “And yet here we are.”

“I’m not brooding,” Bellamy shoots her a look. “I’m thinking deeply.”

Clarke raises an eyebrow at him and sees the smile twitch at his lips. “A technicality.”

“Alright, fine. Call it what you will. I just want to be sure everything’s set to go if anything comes up,” Bellamy admits gruffly. He puts down his cleaning kit and rag with a sigh and begins to reassemble his gun.

Clarke reaches out and gently touches his shoulder. “What’s going to come up, Bellamy?” He meets her eyes and shrugs. 

“A rogue assassin, a guard uprising, weather, famine, Monty wandering off, Harper contracting the flu... “

“Alright, well guns are going to help with two of those things,” Clarke agrees with a small laugh. “But the rest of them? I think you and I can handle those things together. No need for extra clean guns.”

“You and me, huh?” Bellamy repeats, tilting his head back against the steel of the Ark and looking at Clarke out of the side of his eye.

“Yeah, we can handle anything. Promise.” Clarke meets his slow smile and he nods.

“Alright.”

“Yeah? You’re going to end your crusade against dirt?”

“For now. Can’t make any guarantees about tomorrow though.”

“Wouldn’t want you to make any promises you can’t keep,” Clarke teases him and then gets to her feet and cocks her head down at Bellamy as he packs away his kit and shoulders his rifle. “You going to sit there all day or are you going to come get a drink with me?”

“I could use a drink,” Bellamy admits and catches Clarke’s offered hand to pull himself to his feet. 

He keeps her hand trapped in his as they walk across camp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> anon requested: future season; Clarke and Bellamy on a roadtrip, exploring stuff for "500 word prompt fill"

“Clarke, c’mere,” Bellamy says quietly, tilting his head and Clarke crouches down next to him and peers through the underbrush. Bellamy gestures with his chin and Clarke follows his gaze across the sky blue lake toward the western bank. There’s a pack of wild dogs, or maybe even wolves, from this distance Clarke can’t tell, but it’s made up of four fully grown dogs and three small puppies romping by the water. Clarke grins as one of the puppies races at it’s packmate and overshoots, rolling down the bank. Across the water, the playful yelps echo and Clarke turns to find Bellamy smiling at her. 

“Ever wanted a dog, Clarke?” 

“Never really thought about,” Clarke admits, resting her chin in her palm and watching as two of the puppies leap at the ears of one of the disinterested adults. “I suppose it might be nice, if it stayed small. What about you?”

“Sure. I mean, O has Helios. I wouldn’t mind a big dog, keep me company back at camp on patrols.”

“I can see that,” Clarke says and stands back up and rolls her shoulders under the weight of her pack. They’ve been out of Arkadia for two weeks, scouting to the West beyond known Trikru territory. It’s not an especially exciting mission, but after their first year on the ground, both she and Bellamy can go without excitement. All they’re meant to do is map the land and establish friendly relationships with any Grounder villages they come across. 

So far, the villages have been far and few between, but the ones they do find have been welcoming. They exchange news for the geography of the land and trade for either supplies or something novel: a pretty piece of painted glass, the skeletal remains of an old book, jewelry wrought from metal that Bellamy clips Clarke’s hair up into with a playful smile. 

The land is beautiful too. Rolling hills and mountains that they hike without haste. Vistas of lakes and valleys and sunsets that make Bellamy glow golden. Rolling rain clouds that throw the green of the trees into stark relief, fields of wildflowers that they sleep in at night. They forgo their tents when the night is clear and sleep next to the fire, bedrolls pushed together so that they can stay close: legs intertwined, Clarke’s head pillowed on Bellamy’s shoulder as they extend their hands and trace the constellations in the sky.

Bellamy stands as well from his crouch and tugs on Clarke’s hair. “Which way? Towards the dogs or ‘round the East bank?”

“Following your lead, Bellamy,” Clarke says. They have a month before they’re due to return to camp, another week of discovering new territory and Clarke couldn’t care less about what they find as long as she’s got Bellamy beside her.

“East it is,” Bellamy decides and smiles, surprised when Clarke leans up on her toes and kisses him short and quick.

“No guard dogs for you?” Clarke asks instead of answering Bellamy’s raised eyebrows.

“Nah, I’ve already got you, I know I’m safe.” And then he ducks and chases her mouth. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> aroom0fonesown requested: "Thank God for Small Mercies" for '500 word prompt fills'

No one in Arkadia is prepared for the summer weather. Spring is wonderful, bright clean air that invigorates everyone after their long winter and the challenges of their months on the ground. But summer, with it’s high heat and muggy, thick air is a challenge all on its own. Work days become shorter, people’s tempers flare and most of the remaining delinquents find excuses to be anywhere but trapped within the steel walls of Arkadia that absorb heat and turn camp into a veritable furnace.

When they’re relieved of their duties, Clarke finds she most often ends up with Raven and Octavia at the river. They strip off their shirts and pants and wade into the cold water, lounging in the shallows until the sky gets pink and they hear the distant gong for dinner.

Some days Monty and Miller join them, sometimes Jasper and Harper. Bellamy is the only one who has yet to make it to the river after his guard duty. 

Clarke has tried to cajole him, has tried to sneakily get Kane to switch his shifts so he’s free when they all leave, but to no avail. “One of us should be here in camp, Clarke,” Bellamy always says. “You go, have fun.”

“I’d have more fun if I knew you were enjoying yourself as well,” Clarke says dryly and Bellamy shrugs.

“You know my type of fun,” Bellamy says with a smile. 

“You’re going to get heat stroke,” Clarke warns him, slipping her finger under the tight wrist cuff of Bellamy’s guard jacket and feels his pulse flutter under her fingertips, “as your friend who’s also a doctor, I prescribe you take a break.”

“As your friend who’s also the Captain of the Guard, I order you not to worry about me.” 

“I don’t take orders from you,” Clarke snorts and they smirk at each other.

“Go on, Clarke,” Bellamy always says and shoves her lightly in the shoulder toward the gate where Raven and Octavia wait.

But the hottest day of the year is sweltering. It feels like they have to fight through the air and are drenched before they even get to the river. They end up stretched out on the shady bank in their wet clothes.

There’s a crash of underbrush and they half heartedly look up to see Bellamy, stripped down to the waist and flushed with heat. “Well look who finally listened to reason!” Raven calls. He gives them a small wave and then strides into the river and dives in, coming up to shake the water from his shaggy hair.

“About time,” Octavia grumbles and flops on her back. “God it’s so hot. I hate this weather.”

“Yeah,” Clarke agrees with Octavia, but she’s propped herself up on her elbows to watch Bellamy and the rivulets of water streaming down his chest and arms, glinting against his copper skin as he heads back to the bank to join them. “But thank god for small mercies.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am!](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...I'm the worst I can't remember who requested this but : "Bellamy and Clarke sneaking around, keeping it quiet because it's new but they get less and less subtle." for "500 word prompt-fill"

High summer evenings cast a hazy glow over Arkadia, drowned in the chirp of crickets and cicadas. The gates stay open until nightfall now, and Bellamy’s with Lincoln and Octavia outside the walls, flopped back in the grass and racing Octavia in weaving flower crowns. Clarke strolls out of the gates and toes Bellamy in the leg until he frowns, fingers still braiding furiously as he looks up at her. “What?”

“There’s a situation I thought you might want to look at,” Clarke says, “back inside.” Bellamy looks at her for a moment before he drops the half completed crown and stands up. He grins at Clarke and she smiles back, privately. 

“Duty calls, O. Lincoln.”

“You lose by default,” Octavia calls after him as she finishes her crown and places it on Lincoln’s head. Bellamy just gives them an absent wave, head ducked down to speak softly to Clarke. Octavia and Lincoln smirk at each other.

**

“Hey, Clarke, I think Abby’s looking for you,” Bellamy says, leaning on their table in the Dining bay. Two seats over from Clarke, Abby looks up with a raised eyebrow. “Uh, I mean-”

“I’m glad you’re here,” Clarke interrupts him, “I had something to talk to you about.”

“Do you want to join us, Bellamy?” Abby asks with a knowing smile.

“I actually think Bellamy wanted to talk elsewhere, right Bellamy?” Clarke asks, already standing up and pushing her half finished plate of food at Jasper who grins and scrapes it on to his plate. 

“Well next time then,” Abby says.

“Sure, uh, what?” Bellamy asks, tearing his eyes away from Clarke’s mouth.

“Nothing,” Abby says mildly and Jasper snorts into his food as Bellamy almost trips over himself when Clarke tugs on his shirt sleeve to hurry him up. “How longs it been?” She asks the table at large.

“Five weeks?” Raven muses.

“Nah,” says Miller, “Eight.”

**

Clarke’s mouth is hot against his own, his arms wrapped around her back and to keep her close to him even as he presses her into the wall. Clarke whines into his mouth, arching against him and fisting her hands in his hair to angle him the way she wants him.

“Bed?” Bellamy murmurs, breaking away to kiss down her neck and nose under her shirt so he can bite at the tendons in her shoulder.

“No, too far,” Clarke murmurs into his hair and Bellamy hums, unravels his arms so that he can yank down her Grounder made leggings and hoists her up against the wall, bracing her on her thighs.

“Too far, definitely too far,” he affirms even as her hands are unbuttoning his pants and pulling his cock out. He slides into her and they both shiver at it. “God, Clarke, how do you always feel so good?” Bellamy growls into her neck and Clarke fists hands into the back of his shirt.

“Bellamy, less talk, more fucking,” Clarke insists even as she’s rubbing her cheek against his trying to find his mouth again. 

And yeah. Bellamy can get with that program.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am!](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	7. Fake Marriage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: How do you feel about fake dating AUs? Or maybe fake marriage even. How about with a side order of "doing it to save my friends".

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for rosymamacita and her excellent prompt for my follower give away.
> 
> Chapter is rated: M

“You’ll want to be careful with my sister,” Roan advises as they walk through the hushed halls of the old church. It’s been remodeled since the war, Bellamy thinks, but the high ceilings and stained glass windows remain is surprisingly good condition. “Nialetta’s been a queen since she was eighteen, a widow since she was twenty. She’s fair, or so I’ve heard, but bored.”

Next to him, Clarke rolls her shoulders back in a way that makes her just slightly taller, a trick Bellamy finds endearing but also pointless, since most people seem to forget Clarke’s size the second she opens her mouth. “She’ll listen to us,” Clarke says, assured. 

Roan responds with a noncommittal hum, one that Bellamy doesn’t love, but before either he or Clarke can respond, the big oak doors open and Roan steps forward to lead them into the Queen of Tariokru’s receiving chambers. A woman in her late twenties looks down on them from the remnants of a pulpit, eyes sharp and calculating as Bellamy watches them sweep first over himself, then Clarke and finally lingering on Roan. The stained glass window behind her throws arcs of colored light across the floor and Clarke glances up at him, face lit in blue. Bellamy gives her reassuring quirk of his lips.

“King Roan.” The Queen’s voice is rich and low and the sharp eyes that Bellamy recognizes from Roan’s face aren’t exactly warm, but neither are they hostile. “I haven’t seen you in years, and here you turn up with Skaikru, bringers of death and people without a home. Somehow I don’t think I’m going to like whatever it is you want.”

“Queen Nialetta,” Roan says as he ducks his chin in what might be considered a show of respect but on Roan it just looks haughty. “I present to you Clarke and Bellamy kom Skaikru. They are in search of a home. I have told them of your generosity in the past, and they have hoped you might be so generous with them.” Grounder court speech is formal, even spoken in English to benefit Bellamy and Clarke.

Nialetta straightens from her forward lean and braces her hands on the pulpit as she considers Clarke and Bellamy more fully. Bellamy meets her eyes when they linger on his face, and when they slide to consider Clarke and something cold sparks in them, Bellamy can’t help the half step he takes closer to Clarke. 

“Brother,” Nialetta laughs. “You aren’t being honest. I recognize this one.” Clarke lifts her chin and Bellamy sees her eyes flutter. He aches for her, that even outside of the coalition and probably for the rest of her life, Wanheda will stalk her. 

Sure enough, as Nialetta descends from her pulpit, her eyes stay intent on Clarke. “Wanheda, you are known. My brother is right, I have helped those without homes resettle in the past. I have land and access to fresh water and my people here are peaceful. Tariokru are more congenial than Azgeda and I have come to accept the benefits of this. You, though, are a killer. What guarantee do I have that my people will be safe if I let Skaikru settle with us?”

“Our people had to fight for our lives from the moment we came to Earth,” Clarke starts and there’s no tremble to her clear voice. “Yes, we’ve killed, but we make powerful allies.”

“Ah,” Nialetta says with a little smile and Bellamy is suddenly reminded of a large cat who’s prey has just walked straight between her paws.”You speak of alliances but you are an alliance breaker, Wanheda.”

Bellamy just barely manages to stop himself from correcting Nialetta and the effort must be visible because Roan turns his head away, but not before Bellamy sees his amused smile. 

“The coalition didn’t fall apart because of me,” Clarke says evenly. “Our people are survivors of the fall out as much as any other ‘kru.”

“I am not speaking of the coalition,” Nialetta says, stepping close to Clarke. She’s as tall as her brother and Bellamy sees the tension in Clarke’s body as she resists rolling her shoulders again. She holds herself at ease and relaxed, meets the Queen’s gaze without flinching. He knows that later, Clarke’s fingers will tremble a little when she reaches for his hand. 

“I am speaking of the fact,” Nialetta continues, “That you left your own people for three months by choice. My people have obligations to the land and to each other…If this is how a leader of Skaikru acts, what assurance do I have that you or your people won’t leave whenever suits you?”

“We have nowhere else to go,” Clarke says honestly. “We need a home where we can put down actual roots: build homes, raise families, actually live rather than survive. You offer us the chance to be human again, Nialetta.”

“Pretty sentiments,” Nialetta admits and turns her back on Clarke to look up at the stained glass windows. “But sentiment is weak, I’m sure you know that. Tariokru and Azgeda fought for years over land.Treaties made based on equally noble ideals and they all fell through. The fighting stopped when my mother married me to the Tarion King, a guarantee of children and a political promise is harder to break when you are bound by blood. Among other things.” She smiles back over her shoulder at Clarke and Bellamy feels his stomach drop.

“You’re saying you want a marriage,” Clarke says cooly. 

“Specifically, I want a marriage that links Wanheda to Tariokru. My late husband has a brother around your age. He is a strong fighter and has a good heart. You will like him.”

Through his own panic, Bellamy isn’t sure what to expect from Clarke. As likely as she is to stare Nialetta down, call her bluff and negotiate a less extreme treaty, Bellamy doesn’t think he would be surprised if Clarke agreed in that quiet, stone faced way she has when she doesn’t see an out. He has seen Clarke risk her life over and over again for the slim chance of their people’s survival. A marriage, in comparison, is nothing.

What Bellamy doesn’t expect is the way Clarke ducks her head, toes the ground with the tip of her boot as if bashful. “It’s a fair offer,” Clarke says, “but one I can’t accept.”

“No?” Nialetta asks, an eyebrow arched.

“I’m already married,” Clarke says, and actually manages to blush as she looks up at Nialetta. Bellamy suddenly realizes where this is going and resists dropping his head because _of course_. “And as you said: that’s a bond not easily broken.”

“Especially when it’s a love match,” Roan says without any inflection and Bellamy does breifly close his eyes at that. But when Clarke reaches for his hand, Bellamy doesn’t hesitate to take it. Like he ever would. 

Clarke gives his hand a little tug so that Bellamy steps up close next to her and she grins up at him, a little bit _isn’t this funny?_ And a little bit, _aren’t we clever?,_ but also so assured in them both that Bellamy gives her only a mildly exasperated look as he intertwines their fingers and smiles at Nialetta, who’s watching them with her head cocked. 

“Sorry to disappoint,” he says, which definitely isn’t in line with the formal language that’s been used, but to be fair, he doesn’t give a fuck. “Skaikru has knowledge and technology and weapons that we’re willing to share. You’re people would benefit from this just as much as we would from any land you gave us.”

“That may be so,” Nialetta concedes, still considering them, hawk-like. Then she grins, a little mischievous and claps her hands together. “Certainly worth discussing. But listen to me now, it’s late in the day and talks like these can go on a long time. Stay as my guests tonight, and tomorrow we can come to terms.”

After a quick glance at Roan, Clarke agrees and Nialetta’s smile reminds Bellamy of Octavia’s when she was younger, when she thought she was clever. That should have been warning sign number one, Bellamy thinks later, but he’s distracted by Clarke’s thumb running over his knuckles.

“Thank you, we’d appreciate that,” Clarke says. They’ve had a long day, up before sunrise with Roan to guide them to Nialetta’s territory with few breaks for food or rest. Bellamy can feel the aches in his body beginning to catch up with him.

“Join me for dinner,” Nialetta says, and it sounds like a command.

“Bold, Clarke,” Roan says out in the hallway, as they wait for one of Nialetta’s attendants to escort them to their rooms so they can clean up before joining her again. “But you’re risking your treaty if she catches you lying.”

“She won’t catch us.” Clarke shrugs and leans back into the wall. Bellamy can see the exhaustion in her face. “We make it through dinner tonight and negotiations tomorrow, and we’re fine. It’s all going to be formal anyway. What’s the worst that happens: Bellamy and I share a room for an evening? We’ve done that before.”

They’ve shared bedrolls before, Bellamy thinks, curled around each other for warmth and comfort and Clarke’s soft hair tickling his nose when he wakes up first, her soft smell in his nose. It’s never been an issue, and as much as Bellamy wishes they weren’t lying about this, he’s not all that concerned about their pulling it off. 

Sure enough, Nialetta’s given them a big, beautiful room with more stained glass windows on the second story of the old church. There’s a large bed with huge pillows that Clarke throws herself down on while Bellamy washes up in the basin of water provided. 

“Come on, sleepy,” he goads Clarke, flicking water from his fingers at her face. “Clean up and lets get some food in you, huh?”

Clarke makes an undignified noise into her pillow and Bellamy annoys her by throwing himself down next to her so that the bed bounces her. “Bellamy,” she complains, but pushes herself up and mutters all the way to the water basin, stripping off her shirt and scrubbing at her face and the top of her chest with the washcloth, washing off dust and grime from their long ride. Bellamy pokes through the chest and big wardrobe which, when he pushes the clothes aside, turns out to also house the old pipes of an organ. 

He pulls on a loose shirt and keeps his pants, but tosses Clarke a comfortable looking dress, cooler and less constrictive than her coat and deer skin leggings. She smiles at him gratefully and pulls it on over her head. It’s red, a color he’s never seen her wear before. “Looks good on you,” he says easily and she smiles at him.

There’s a soft knock at the door and Bellamy and Clarke follow the quiet, pretty attendant through the high, arching hallways. Bellamy expects a long table, maybe, with formal, high backed chairs and a good deal more of ritualized language, but when the attendant opens the door to where she says their dining, he couldn’t have been more wrong. 

“Jesus,” Bellamy swears and even Clarke balks at the sight. 

Instead of formal seating arrangements, Nialetta’s got small, low tables, surrounded by pillows and cushions. The room is adjacent to a balcony, the doors to which are thrown open and the smell of sweet spring flowers wafts in. The ceiling and walls are draped in billowy fabrics and from where Nialetta is already sprawled out across several cushions, her head in handsome man’s lap, Bellamy knows exactly what he and Clarke have just walked into.

“I find,” Nialetta says lazily, rolling to sit up and greet them, “that formality gets exhausting. And you two, so young and already the leaders of your people, must rarely get a chance to indulge in each other.”

Clarke opens her mouth but can’t seem to come up with anything and closes it again. “Thank you,” Bellamy says quickly, covering for her. “This is…” and words fail him to, because if they were young and in love and together, this would be amazing. But as it is, they are young and in love but also really not talking about that right now, let alone sprawling in each other’s laps, and this feels like it could be more torture than anything else. From Nialetta’s challenging eyes, he realizes this is a test and Clarke is already over thinking it.

He takes her hand, because that’s what grounds them both these days and gives her a gentle tug as he steps into the room. “Isn’t this nice?” he asks Clarke. Her eyes snap up to his and he raises his eyebrows. _Aren’t we clever?_ He reminds her with his smirk and her answering smile confirms that yes, they are very clever, 

“Sorry,” Clarke says, smiling again as she sinks down crosslegged on one of the overlarge pillows, still holding Bellamy’s hand. “We aren’t used being so public in our relationship.”

“I understand,” Nialetta murmurs and waves a hand that produces attendants with goblets of wine and plates of meats and fruits. “But here, among friends, celebrating hopeful futures together, why not indulge?”

“Hard to argue with that,” Clarke agrees even though she looks like she would like to argue anyway, and she’s a little tense when Bellamy drops down next to her. He doesn’t let himself think about it before he slings an arm over her shoulders and curls his fingers around the curve of her arm. He feels her take a slow breath at his touch and reminds himself it’s not him she’s nervous about, but herself.

“We don’t need to, huh?” Bellamy asks her, close and soft the way he talks to her when they’re alone. It feels a little odd with Nialetta’s eyes on them, he doesn’t let himself think about that either. When it comes to protecting Clarke from herself, Bellamy tends to not think about very much in general. Clarke hums and then leans confidently into his side, fitting herself into the hollow of his shoulder, and shoots Nialetta a smile that’s meant to be grateful as she accepts a cup of wine.

Nialetta turns out to be a very smooth hostess. She remains in her companion’s lap for most the evening, completely at ease with herself in their presence, which seems to spark the competitive side of Clarke’s nature after she’s finished her first cup of wine. Clarke ends up sprawling out next to Bellamy, curling a hand around his calf and pressing into the muscle there as she talks to Nialetta about Polis. 

The later it gets, the more wine seems to be in rotation and Bellamy finds that his cup is never empty no matter how much he drinks, and the same for Clarke’s. She’s flushed in the candlelight as it grows dark outside, and Bellamy lets himself stare at how it lights up her face and cleavage, because he’s supposed to. Bellamy passes her bites of meat and cheeses to keep the wine from going too much to her head. The first time he does, she almost reaches out to take it from his hand, then meets his eyes and grins at him instead and leans forward to let him feed her. 

She smirks at him when the soft brush of her lips makes Bellamy shiver, and then catches his hand and kisses his knuckles. She keeps his hand in hers, playing with his hand: curling then spreading his fingers, pressing her thumbs into his palm, trailing her fingertips up his broad, blunt hands. She’s so gentle in her touch that Bellamy closes her eyes and lets her circle his wrist her hand, thumb stroking over his pulse point. 

Once they’ve relaxed into this, it comes easy to them, the easy, intimate touches that lovers share. Bellamy has never let himself think about, but now that they’re here, he’s not at all surprised. And when Clarke looks up at him, eyes warm and soft, he knows she’s not either. Oh, he loves this girl and he gives her a smile that she returns, happy and bright. This isn’t so bad, really.

When Clarke fidgets like her back is getting sore from lying on her stomach, Bellamy shifts and spreads his legs so that Clarke is in between them. He catches her eye and then tugs gently on her hand so that she sits up and leans back against his chest, head resting against shoulder. He feels more than hears the hum she makes when he curls an arm around her waist, leaning back on his other arm for support.

They put on a good show. Nialetta’s eyes grow less suspicious and more amused as the night goes on and by the time the candles are guttering and flickering in their pools of wax, she’s entirely at ease, even laughing aloud when Bellamy and Clarke talk about some of the seemingly tragic events that happened within the first months of their landing that now seem like nothing in comparison to what they’ve been through.

“You two are fine leaders,” Nialetta decides finally in her low voice. “Tariokru will be glad, I’m sure, to welcome Skaikru under your direction.” She stands elegantly and brushes a hand over her companion’s hair. “But it grows late and if we are to negotiate tomorrow, I would advise we all get the rest we need. Don’t,” she says with a sly smirk, “keep each other up too late on your wedding night.”

Before either Bellamy or Clarke can protest, she grins at them and glides out of the room, the light fabric of her clothes billowing behind her. 

“She fucking knew,” Bellamy growls as they tipsily wander back to their room, torn between amusement and frustration at being tricked so easily. “She wanted the guns and technology all along. Roan tipped her off.”

“Probably,” Clarke laughs. She sways close to him and Bellamy steadies her with a hand low on her back. “That’s ok though, we were willing to share that anyway.”

“Yeah but,” Bellamy gripes as he runs a hand up her back and returns it to her shoulders, tugging her close, “would be nice to have gotten there without thinking I was going to lose you.”

He doesn’t process what he’s saying until the words are out his mouth. He hesitates, considers qualifying them, but doesn’t, because they are at the door to their chambers and Clarke is swinging to face him, smile free on her pretty face.

“You just like to argue,” Clarke tells him and fits her hands around the back of his neck, rocks up on his toes and looks him in the eye, waiting. “You want to keep talking about this?”

“Nah,” Bellamy says, running his hands down her back feeling her curves underneath the soft fabric of her dress. He gathers and bunches it in his hands at the small of her back and ducks his head, gives her a quick, tentative kiss, just to see if she likes it, see if they’re there yet. The way her mouth goes soft under his, the way she melts against him is all he needs to walk her back into the wall and kiss her again, make it deep and real and good.

“That bed,” Clarke murmurs against his lips, “was really comfortable. I don’t think you really appreciated it before.”

“Yeah, ‘cause I was getting your lazy ass up for dinner,” Bellamy murmurs into the skin of Clarke’s neck so she shivers. “You thinking we should go appreciate that now?”

“Uh-huh.” Clarke squeezes the back of his neck. “Yes, Bellamy. I think we absolutely need to go appreciate it.”

And they do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am!](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	8. Sneaking Around

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: I'd love a canon verse friends with benefits/sneaking around/public sex thing for Bellarke. Lots of smut (so E rating is fine with me!) Clarke with a praise kink and a Bellamy who loves dirty talking her. Bellamy a little dominant in sex, both have hidden romantic feelings underneath the sex (because ofc they do), would like them both to get off! Please and thank you!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for bellamyblakeprotectionsquad2k16 for my follower give away on tumblr.
> 
> The chapter is rated E.

The reality of the world ending in six months really does wonders for people’s priorities. 

Clarke can’t say she’s an exception, because even as she and Bellamy scramble to find the answers; find a home that’s going to be safe from radiation; find a way to stop the meltdown of the closest plant; find a way to keep everyone alive long enough to accomplish both those things, she lets herself be selfish.

Bellamy’s lips are chapped, like she knew they would be, and his tongue is slick and demanding in her mouth even though his breath shudders in his surprise when she first kisses. “God,” he says into her neck the first time they do this, “Clarke, you’re so fucking beautiful, you feel so goddamn good.” It makes her go all shivery, legs trembling, voice weak. He had picked her up, arms strong under her knees, hands possessive on her ass as he fucked her into a wall, mouth covering hers to keep her whimpers from waking everyone else who’d slept just a few rooms away in the Polis tower. 

They don’t tell anyone, because it’s no one’s business what they do when they’re not actively trying to save the world (again), and Clarke finds such relief in looking up at Bellamy during rushed meetings on the Rover hood with maps and supply numbers and Raven’s unreadable diagrams and calculations, and seeing the hot promises in his eyes meant just for her. It gets her through the day, and the sun setting takes on new meaning. Night doesn’t bring fear anymore, it brings Bellamy and pleasure and a relief from feeling so alone.

He likes to press her up against things: tree trunks, the body of the Rover, a handy boulder in a river they stop next to for the night. Likes to run his mouth down her body, settle between her legs and lick her cunt until she can’t speak. His eyes are dark and hot as he sucks on her clit, lips red and swollen and face slick with her arousal because he gets so deep into her, so hungry for her. She licks broad and wet across his chin, his stubble sharp under her tongue, as she cleans him up playfully and lifts her lips to his so he can fuck her taste into her mouth his tongue, making her moan.

”Unbelievable” he’ll tell her, as she fumbles to get her hands on him. “You know how sweet you are? Babe, I could eat you all day and still miss the way you taste.”

He figures out pretty quickly she likes the sound of his voice. Bellamy’s always been a talker, but when it’s just the two of them, his voice goes extra gravely and deep and Clarke would swear she feels the vibrations of it through her body. 

“How does that feel, huh?” Bellamy asks her when he’s got his cock inside her, hands tight on her hips so that he can drive into her slow and deep, grind into her until she’s near incoherent, stuttering over his name, bracing herself in their hastily made nest of pine needles. “Come on, tell me you like it. Tell me you like how I fill up your pretty cunt, Clarke.”

“I love it,” she manages to gasp. “God, I love it.”

“Yeah, that’s right you do,” Bellamy growls into her ear. “Fuck, Clarke, you’re so good. So good for me.” And she moans at _that_ , at his praise, tries to push back against his hands so he’ll fuck her harder and he laughs, a little rough. “Shit, you sound so hot. If I fuck you hard like you want, you gonna say my name?”

When she agrees breathlessly, he gives it to her, fingers bruising her hips, teeth sunk into her shoulder and Clarke can’t stop whimpering. Bellamy buries his face in her neck when he comes, his body convulsing against hers, a unexpectedly soft, sweet whisper of her name lost there. Clarke drops her head, rocks back against him gently, content to wait until he comes back to himself before he tugs her back against his chest so he can feel her up and pull slowly, sweet and intense, at her nipples, as he rubs at her clit until Clarke can’t stand it anymore.

Bellamy loves fingering her any chance he gets, likes to watch her face as he slips her one, two, three fingers fast, here on the riverbank when they’ve taken a break in their trek on a solo mission. He flexes them inside her, twists his wrist so she feels his knuckles. No matter how hard he fucks her on his hand, he always kisses her softly, lips gentle, covers her gasping, open mouth with his own when she gets close, hums in contentment when he feels the sharp, swift contractions of her cunt. 

“Oh that’s right,” he tells her as he draws it out, keeps rubbing up into her so that Clarke’s whole body feels like it’s going to fly apart with how good it is. “That’s what I wanted. Good girl, Clarke. Now I’ll fuck you, don’t worry.” He kisses her creased eyebrows, her lax mouth and slides his cock into her before she can miss the absence of his fingers. When she wraps her arms and legs around him, clinging to him on the thick sun-warmed grass, he grips her back just as tight, kisses her neck and the tops of her breasts and lets her suck on his tongue as he rolls his hips into hers. 

It’s not always easy, finding these moments, and not always private. Clarke’s been on her knees blowing Bellamy just a hundred paces from the main camp, relying on the darkness and their people’s distraction to keep them uninterrupted and alone. She likes the thrill of it, so safe in comparison to the sick feeling of knowing that with one wrong contingent of their plan and it’s all over. Getting caught with her fingers working over her clit as Bellamy thrusts into her mouth, his hands cradling the back of her head… it would be embarrassing, but only that. 

And the thought that she could be embarassed, still, as she’s fighting to save her people makes her laugh. It’s human, she thinks in wonder as she let’s Bellamy hold her for a moment after they’ve both come, quiet in the dark of his slapdash lean-to, his fingers brushing lazily over her lips, letting her taste herself. It’s human to keep secrets and fuck and get turned on by the sound of her friend’s voice. They still can give this to each other. She smooths her hand down to his stomach, greedy for more contact. She wants all of him so much, she loves him with what feels like every part of her- feels her ache for Bellamy even in the soles of her feet, the palms of her hands. 

But she can’t tell him that. Not now, when they’re all on the brink of dying, when speaking the words would make the hopelessness of their situation settle deep in the pit of her stomach. This kind of love wants a future to express and manifest in, a future in which to mine the depths of their connection, to know Bellamy better than she knows herself, and the likelihood of that happening is so devastatingly low that Clarke can’t bring herself to think about it, to lose hope over. So they have this: these moments alone when Bellamy touches her and loves her with his body and voice and Clarke gives him every back that she can manage, and they wait to see if there can be more.

“Sweet girl,” Bellamy murmurs to her in the dark, and Clarke runs her hand over his face, feeling his expression, sleepy and relaxed and it makes her heart swell. “I can hear your mind goin’,” he whispers and pulls her closer, wraps an arm over her middle and tucks his face into her shoulder. “Turn it off for me?”

And for him, for the first time in a long while, Clarke can.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)
> 
>  
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	9. Paris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 1: in honour of your going to france. artsy, hipstery bellarke having a whirlwind romance in france. do it.
> 
> Prompt 2: We used to date but haven’t talked seen each other in years. I’m on a work trip to the city you now live in; should we get a drink so you can show me around (and then probably take me back to your place)?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got lazy and combined raincityruckus and anxiouslee's prompts to make one glorious angsty French bellarke fest. Likely to go back and write the prequel to this at some point...
> 
> This chapter is rated M.

_It's been ages,_ Clarke writes in her perfectly spelled, grammatically exact French, _and Octavia said you were living in Paris now. Would you like to meet up? I still think of you and your silly little Vespa._

Bellamy stares hard at the message, and the formal ‘Vous’ and the smiling, blonde haired girl in the profile picture. He wants to tell her he also still thinks about her, the way her arms wrapped around his waist and the sound of her laughter, the way she had looked up at him, shy, that last night, right before she had kissed him. ‘La Petite Princesse’, he had called her, because she had never gone anywhere, in the months she had stayed with his family, without her copy of The Little Prince.

 _Why not_ , Bellamy writes back, and keeps his own language formal as well, although he slips into some rougher Parisian French because he's feeling testy. _I can probably spare an hour. Where are you living? I can meet you somewhere close to your apartment._

He meets her in the gardens of the Luxembourg Palace, at the cute cafe that looks out across the beautiful green of the lawns, the Palm trees and fountain where kids rent tiny little sailboats to push across. God, she looks just like he remembers, a little older, a little more beautiful since eighteen, but the same blue eyes and obstinate jut of her chin, even when she's just taking in the view.

“Hey.” He greets her in English and sees her frown even as she's fighting back her delighted grin.

“If you speak to me in English, I'll never learn,” Clarke laughs in French, sounding just like her old self even as she leaps up from her little table and kisses his cheeks. Because she's American, she actually kisses him, lips pressed into his skin and Bellamy knows his body stiffens in surprise. They haven't spoken in years, not after the first few months Clarke went back to the States and stopped replying to his Facebook messages. At 23, Bellamy had let it go. He was finishing his own studies and there were lots of girls, older girls, with pretty hair and charming laughter and witty one liners who easily distracted him from the absence of Clarke Griffin.

“You look good. Still handsome,” Clarke says in formal French and it rubs Bellamy the wrong way that she won't use ’tu’ with him, when the last time they were together she had been in his bed, ruffled and lazy and making him promise to stay in touch with her. Then again, it would probably annoy Bellamy if she did, assuming a degree of intimacy they hadn't had since she had gone home the morning after they had finally gotten their acts together and spent the whole night trying to ignores Clarke’s packed bags and the early morning birds.

“So do you,” Bellamy admits. “Still Clarke.” He can't resist the wrinkled nose and smile she flashes him when he over pronounces the ‘r’ in her name to make up for his natural pronounciation. “What are you doing in Paris?”

She's studying architecture Paris La Villette for masters, of course. Just been in Paris a little over a week now. Yes, she's been in touch with Octavia, hadn't she mentioned it to Bellamy? Oh, well they hadn’t ever stopped talking. And isn’t it nice she’s living in Spain with her boyfriend? College in the states had been fun, but she had gotten tired of premed and missed France. No, she hadn’t ever forgotten staying with the Blake family her senior year of high school, and couldn't imagine not coming back. “And it's been so long since I've seen you,” she adds.

“I know,” Bellamy admits, slouching in his little green chair, idly stirring sugar into his second espresso. 

Clarke is quiet for a moment. “I was serious, you know,” she says is her pretty, careful French. “I still think about you.” When Bellamy looks up at her, she’s gazing out across the heat hazy lawn, expression a little wistful. She’s only nibbled on the little cake she got and Bellamy can’t remember Clarke Griffin ever not finishing her food before. He realizes she must be nervous to see him again. 

“Le Petite Princesse,” Bellamy teases her gently. “I’ve thought about you too.” She glances at him and then smiles, pushes the hair out of her face with a quick, practiced motion that make the bangles on her wrist clink.

“Did you ever write that novel?” Clarke asks him suddenly, and Bellamy laughs at that. 

“No, never quite got there. I work with unions now. I help them organize.”

“Oh,” Clarke says with a knowing little nod that used to drive Bellamy crazy when she was a guest in his mother’s house. “So you’re the one I have to thank for the slow Metro.”

“That would be me, yeah,” Bellamy chuckles and Clarke shakes her head. “But I can make up for it sometime, if you want. I’ve still got my vespa.” He had taken Clarke out one weekend, towards the end of the semester when Octavia had been visiting her father and his mother in one of her moods. They had gone to the Coast and hung out on the beach. Bellamy remembers lying in his hotel room, right across the hall from Clarke and willing her to come knock on his door. She hadn’t, not that night. 

Clarke’s lip quirk up at the suggestion but then she sobers and glances at the watch on her wrist. “I would love that but… I think maybe I’ve taken up more of your time than you already intended?”

Bellamy feels bad for his brusque first message and shrugs, rolling his shoulders. “I have more time than anticipated,” he admits. “Come on, let me show you around.”

They walk the Rue du Saint Michel, and then all the way over to the Jardins Tulleries at the Louvre. Clarke talks with her hands, more effusive when she can’t remember the right word or struggles with correct phrasing. Bellamy waits her out, less impatient than he used to be, more aware of how amazing it is that Clarke would throw herself into an entire semester abroad when she was eighteen with the limited French she had at the time.

He had wanted to help her, he remembers, when she had first arrived, had used his own basic English when she fumbled over simple words. “Do not do that,” she had snapped in overtly academic French, “This is an immersion program, Bellamy. I am meant to immerse.”

So Bellamy had gone in the opposite direction, used more slang and dropped forms of speech that had been drilled into Clarke’s head and spoken too quickly for her to follow until her frustration gave way to laughter and she had caved. “Alright, Bellamy,” she had begged. “In English, please.”

They walk from the Louvre all the way to the National Assembly and it’s getting late when Bellamy glances at his phone. He can’t drag himself away though, and they end up sharing tapas at a little Spanish place, share a bottle of red wine and Clarke’s knee brushes his under the bar. Bellamy can’t help himself, slips up and addresses her as ‘tu’ when she tells him how her family is. Her grin lights up her face and Bellamy suddenly feels like a jerk. 

“Why didn’t you message me?” He blurts out and Clarke’s face falls. 

“I dunno,” she says, looking down at the table, trailing her fingers through the condensation from the beer they’ve switched to drinking. “I met someone closer? Starting college was too overwhelming? I missed you more than I thought I should? A lot of reasons. None of them really held up.” She cuts her eyes up at him. “I got into a good program in Tours as well, but… Well, I knew you were in Paris at that point.”

Bellamy just nods a little and looks down. Clarke’s admission is nice, but it's been seven years of silence between them, discounting the occasional mass tag when Clarke was traveling through Europe in her junior year abroad and the funny posts they put on each other's walls when they remember to. Nothing ever as intimate as a private hello. “I'm sorry,” Clarke says, pulling Bellamy from his thoughts, “if I hurt you.”

Bellamy thinks about denying it, thinks of all the girls with pretty hair and natural French he has seen since the morning Clarke left France, but he can’t. She’s right here, sharing his space, her leg companionably pressed along his. “You did, I guess,” Bellamy admits but slips into a rougher, more careless way of talking that makes Clarke’s eyebrows crease in concentration. “I know we were both young, but I only ever wanted to be your friend.”

“Sometimes I don't even know how to do that,” Clarke murmurs. “You always made me feel big things: frustration, relief, companionship…” Bellamy sees her lips begin got purse around another word but falter and he doesn't push her for it. It lies unspoken between them, heightened by the city and the way they've fallen so easily back into each other in just an afternoon. 

Bellamy thinks about going home to his tiny, shoebox apartment with a bedroom barely big enough for his bed, with a kitchen only large enough for hotplates and and a kettle. He's done just fine there on his own for a year and a half, but it feels so empty right now. Clarke is watching him, chin propped in her hand, twirling and twirling a piece of her hair so that it’s crimping in on itself, getting shorter. He cuts her a break, because he can be nice, too.

“You know, you’re a kind of girl it’s hard to get over. Once you get past the attitude and the accent, you're all right, _mon amie_.”

They change the subject, because Clarke’s eyebrows leap at his words and her smile trembles a little and Bellamy is French and kinder about feelings than most people believe him to be. He slips back into old habits of making Clarke work to understand French, already more difficult because they've been drinking, but she holds out longer than he expected before she's giggling uncontrollably into his shoulder.

“Alright, you win,” she says in English. “Say it again, in English.”

“Aw, Clarke,” Bellamy answers her, in his own careful English and watches her smile at his accent. “But how will you ever learn?”

They chat in English for a while and Bellamy likes the way Clarke speaks when she isn’t consciously processing everything she says, the way her voice and speech patterns change, and although he can’t keep up with all of it, he doesn’t mind. He watches her hands and they fill him in on the important parts. 

Outside the bar, they linger together. Bellamy can’t resist tucking a strand of Clarke’s hair behind her ear and she smiles up at him, not shy like she was at eighteen, but careful as she has perhaps learned to be at twenty-five. “I could say goodnight,” Clarke starts, reaching out and taking one of Bellamy’s hands. “But I waited too long when I was eighteen and I’d like to know now if you think we could get our act together a little faster this time.”

“Perhaps I could.” Bellamy pitches his voice low and Clarke's eyes drop to his lips, another old habit he remembers. “If you aren't going to tell me you're going back to the States in the morning.”

“Oh no.” She steps into his space, walks him back into the shadow between a tourist shop open too late and the colorful lights strung along the little bar they'd eaten in. They stand in the dark, hidden from Paris and from seven years of silence and Clarke stands on her tiptoes to kiss Bellamy. “I think Paris suits me.”

“I think so too,” Bellamy laughs and catches the back of her neck to keep her close, kisses her as carefully as the first time he kissed her when they were still young and Bellamy was just learning what tenderness was.

He takes her home to his small apartment and relearns what she looks like without her blouse and fashionable trousers (more beautiful than he remembers), and learns what she likes, because the first time they had done this, he had been the only person she had ever been with. They've both picked up habits and insecurities, little things that make them strangers again in this respect, but when he runs his hand along her thigh, or when she mouths wet and slow at his chest, Bellamy remembers why it had been so easy to fall in love with Clarke.

In the morning, they go for croissants and stand on the Seine. Clarke gets flakes of pastry stuck on the corner of her mouth and Bellamy kisses it away for her, angling his cigarette carefully so he doesn't make her clothes smell like smoke. 

Later, Clarke will make his apartment even smaller with her sketches of Notre Dame taped to his walls and a can of mousse in the bathroom, her chunky statement jewelry and kicked off heels scattered around his bedroom. She rags on him for smoking but steals his cigarettes and Bellamy calls her _ma petite Chou,_ and _mon amie,_ and when the time comes that Clarke finishes her degree and needs to go back to the States, at least for a little while, Bellamy goes with her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am!](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	10. Sparring

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Bellamy and Clarke sparring (canonverse preferably).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for theinsatiabletortoise for my follower give away on tumblr.
> 
> Chapter is rated T

“Nuh-uh,” Bellamy laughs. “No way.”

“What? Come on,” Clarke insists. “Why not?”

“Because, Clarke. You survived three months, alone, wrestling wildcats and, what was it?” Bellamy asks, setting his shoulders back into the steel of the Ark, stretching his legs out in front of him.

Clarke’s lips twitch but she presses them together and narrows her eyes, refusing to grin. “It was one three legged wolf, Bellamy.”

“Right, just one three-legged wolf. No big deal,” Bellamy teases her and knocks his foot against hers. She kicks him back, keeps her foot resting against his and leans back on her hands. The firelight flickers across her face, across her cheeks and her high, pretty forehead; makes her hair shine. Bellamy takes another long drink of moonshine and raises an eyebrow. “You don’t need my help.”

“Yes I do. What, you worried you're not good enough to take me?” The smile she gives him is flirtatious and inviting and Bellamy takes her up on her offer, scrunches his bare toes against her own and likes that something so simple, so affectionate and innocent makes both of their smiles soften and Clarke drop her eyes from his momentarily, sweet in her bashfulness.

Cause the way they're doing this? They're taking it slow. There's so much between them, and so much they're each working through and processing from their previous relationships that throwing themselves together, as much as they want to, is inarguably a terrible idea. So they're careful, and Bellamy may want to kiss Clarke, love her openly and freely and with a wild abandon he's never afforded himself in any aspect of his life before, but he's not ready for that and neither is she. But that's ok, because they'll get there eventually, that much feels absolutely certain. For now, the easy thing they have, part friendship, part love, sustains them. He's happy to watch firelight play across Clarke's face and meet her eyes and share trust and gentle touches that make their hearts beat just a bit fast, make them feel young and innocent despite everything they've done. It's a strange, new excitement that's uniquely theirs.

“Hell yes I'm worried Clarke, you fight dirty. No way I'm a match for you in a fair fight.”

“Well you need to teach me to fight fair,” Clarke counters. “Come on, you know if I ever went up against someone who was really good, ok, really really good, I'd be in trouble.”

Bellamy gives her a skeptical look and shakes his head. “Clarke Griffin, is this a ploy to get me alone? Because if you wanted that you know you just have to ask.” He's joking, but Clarke's little smile, charming and challenging and a little embarrassed makes Bellamy laugh. “Ok, Queen of Subtly, you want to throw me around, I'll find some time. You can beat me up all you want.”

“Not beating,” Clarke insists, “you're more than a match for me.” She smirks though and Bellamy can't help but smirk back. They're both tough and competitive and physically adept. They're good at killing, good at the adrenaline pumping through them, and even though that feeling leaves Bellamy sick after, he doesn't mind feeling it with Clarke.

They do find a time, the next day, a break after lunch when most of their small band is resting and Clarke cups the back of Bellamy's neck where he's sitting cleaning his guns. He packs his kit up and follows her into the woods to a clearing she's found. “Ok?” She asks and Bellamy shrugs.

“Good a place as any,” he says and then takes off his jacket and shakes his arms out. Clarke is shifting her weight from foot to foot, watching him with a little smile on her face. “What did you want to work on.”

“Attacks from behind,” she says instantly and Bellamy kind of wants to thump his head against the nearest tree because of course Clarke wants to do that. He's going to have a few bruises, he knows that already.

“Okay, turn around.” Clark does as she's told, without argument, shockingly, and Bellamy fits his arms around her upper arms, locking them against Clarke's body and dropping his weight a bit so that when Clarke twists experimentally, he doesn't budge. Clarke's body is a warm line of contact against his chest, his hips, his thighs and he can't help but give a little extra squeeze, both out of affection and as a reminder to them both that it's just him, that they're just doing this together. “Right, so what would you do?”

“Kick you?” Clarke asks and tries, shooting a foot back but missing Bellamy's legs as he gives her a small shake, disrupting her balance. 

“You could,” he admits, “if you're with someone who's not expecting that, but it's risky and unlikely you're going to cause enough damage to make them let you go… and you only risk making whoever you’re fighting angry. I know this is a hard concept for you, but the less pissed off your opponent is, generally the better.”

He can practically hear Clarke roll her eyes but he drops his lips to her shoulder and let's her feel his grin. “What else can you think to do?”

Clarke is still for a moment and then she drops her weight and angles her hips back against him. Bellamy jerks, thrown off balance and laughs. “Yeah, good! That's right, you have the advantage of weight and a lower center of gravity.”

“Its my hips,” Clarke says smugly.

“Yeah, yeah, you understand.” Bellamy stands back up straight and readjusts Clarke again so that she's got her legs under her. “This time, don't stop with dropping your weight, once you feel me lose my balance, see if there's room to get your elbow in my stomach or the middle of my chest.”

Clarke nods and takes a breath. Bellamy gives her some motion so she's not trying to work against him when they're static, make it as realistic as possible. Clarke tenses for a moment but then does exactly as he's said, drops her hips down and back and then twists in his arms as Bellamy staggers and taps her elbow lightly back against him. “Yeah, really good,” Bellamy admits. “That'll knock the wind out of someone. You can try to tip me over your shoulder if you get the right angle for it. If it's someone big like me they might drag you down, but you know what you're doing once you get free.”

Clarke hums in agreement and they try a few more times, and Clarke finally does manage to knock Bellamy so off balance that he goes over her shoulder and lands roughly on his side. He chuckles, a little sore, and flops on his back, looks up at Clarke. She's grinning, please and competitive at him and then crouches down on her toes next to him.

“Did I get you?”

“Got me,” Bellamy laughs and stays down, puts his hands up as he catches his breath. “Fast learner.”

“That's me,” Clarke says but something shifts in her eyes and she plants a hand on Bellamy’s chest, pressing him down more for show than any actual restriction of movement. Bellamy goes still under her, barely breathing let's her figure out whatever is going on in her head. She shifts slowly and throws a leg across his hips and settles her weight tentatively so she's straddling him, face still thoughtful.

Bella,y drops his hands to her thighs and gives her a light squeeze, reassuring and friendly, letting her known that this is good by him as she flicks his eyes up to his face. “You feeling a little dominant?” Bellamy asks and his voice his thick. 

Clarke shrugs. “Claiming a prize. Maybe.” Bellamy nods in encouragement and slides his hands off her legs so that she's completely in control. He trusts Clarke in this moment to know each of their boundaries- knows she's working through something and is glad she's comfortable enough to do this with him. “Would you close your eyes?” Bellamy does. He hears Clarke take a careful breath. “You trust me?”

“Completely,” Bellamy whispers, because he does even though his heart races still whenever his eyesight is restricted. He relaxes into the other senses that he still has to ground him. There is the darkness of his eyelids and the weight of Clarke on his stomach, the smell of the forest and the firm earth under his back, the soft sounds of birds and distantly, the echo of noise fro, their people. He's ok. 

Clarke shifts her weight and the soft tickle of her hair is Bellamy's only warning for the soft brush of Clarke's lips against his own. Bellamy takes a measured breath and waits until she kisses him again to kiss her back, just a lazy caress of mouths, no rush, nurturing the soft, warm flame in his stomach. Clarke keeps their kisses easy and careful, kisses him until slowly she's not anymore and Bellamy almost lifts his head to follow her but then thinks better of it. He continues to wait with closed eyes as Clarke traces her fingers across his cheek and the bridge of his nose, touches his lips, dips her fingers into his mouth just briefly and then her hand is gone.

“Open your eyes,” Clarke says quietly and Bellamy does, looks up at her, halo’d in light, eyes searching his face. “That was ok?”

“That was okay,” Bellamy croaks. “That was very okay.” Clarke's smile of relief hurts Bellamy’s chest a little and he knows she worries she doesn't know how to be gentle and kind. She has learned violence and harsh death and is so good at that, but she's good at this too. He touches her leg again and smiles. “I liked that,” he assures her and Clarke's nods, her smile growing. 

“Okay. Okay, good.” She purses her lips together and looks like she's filing that information away. 

“Want to see if you can throw me again?” Bellamy offers, runs his hands up her thighs and thumbs a little at her hips because she's there and he likes touching her like this.

“Yeah, let's try again,” Clarke says and pushes herself up with her hands on his chest and takes a little step back and then offers her hand to Bellamy. He grasps her wrist and pulls himself up. Clarke smiles at him, close and warm against him for a moment, then steps away and just like that, they're back to their tried and true dynamic.

Bellamy’s chest glows as he gets her throw him again and then they work a little bit on blocking direct hits to the face, Bellamy throwing jabs without any weight behind them, projecting as much as he can so Clarke sees them coming. When they walk back to camp, the backs of their hands brush because Clarke walks so near to him, and at the last moment, the last line of trees between them and their people, Clarke pauses and Bellamy turns towards her, expectant. Clarke shakes her head to his unasked question and just leans up to kiss the corner of his mouth, her smile bright on his lips. 

“We can do this now, if you also want to,” Clarke offers, a little shy as she leans back.

“Eh, that's probably alright,” Bellamy decides and then gives her wink to get her to roll her eyes and knock her arm against his. “Yeah, I think I'm ready for that.”

“Good,” Clarke says and tilts her face so Bellamy can press his lips to hers, nothing more than that, but for right now, for where they are, it's everything they need.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	11. Radios

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's the deceptively soft snick of the door closing as he’s setting the cooling device, (Raven’s creation of course,) and then Raven's voice over the radio cutting off from her long winded explanation with, "Shit shit shit."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> season four spec'ing loosely based off of that teaser of radios the @100writers posted on instagram.

There's the deceptively soft snick of the door closing as he’s setting the cooling device, (Raven’s creation of course,) and then Raven's voice over the radio cutting off from her long winded explanation with, "Shit shit shit."

"Raven?" He radios back, "everything ok?"

"The room you’re in... Bellamy you set off the automatic locks when you set the bomb." Raven says, voice tight and brief, the way it goes when she's scared and can't admit it. "There's a countdown going that I'm trying to stop. Here-"

The radio goes quiet for a moment and then Monty's voice crackles over the line. "Raven's trying to stop the countdown," he says softly.

"Countdown to what?" That's Clarke, across the plant from him where she went with Jasper to set two more cooling bombs. 

"It's..." Monty’s voice wavers and then Bellamy hears the steely quality to it when he continues. He knows that voice. "It's the countdown to the room flooding with radiation."

"What?" Clarke snaps. 

Bellamy closes his eyes and leans back against the locked door, takes a deep breath. This was always a risk they knew they were taking. He's vaguely aware of a red light starting to flash in the upper right corner of the room, a warning of what’s to come. He had thought... Well, he had thought a lot of things, but at least it's him. It's easier this way, rather than Raven or Monty or Jasper getting caught in his position. Rather than Octavia... Or Clarke.

"We're doing everything we can to get you out, Bellamy," Monty assures him. 

"I know," he says across the open line, "I know."

"Raven," Clarke’s voice crackles from the radio. She sounds out of breath. "Monty, what's Raven progress?"

"She's coding," Monty replies, "she's trying to override the locks. I'm going to put down the radio and try to stop the radiation release ok? Bellamy, hang tight."

"Roger," Bellamy manages and tucks his radio back into the clip on his belt. There's a sense of overwhelming helplessness starting to crawl up his spine, settle in his stomach, the feeling he's been fighting against his entire life. It's ok, he tries to remind himself, it's ok. There's anger too, not at anyone in particular but just the frustration of thinking he was going to make it. That Octavia laughing again meant something; Raven's dry humor coming easier now... that Clarke's smile in the firelight and her knee brushing his when she sits next to him at night… that those things had meant something.. He had let himself believe that he was going to live, they all were, and that there was a future where happiness didn’t have to stay hidden or tamped down, that he could have all of that without cost or fear of losing it all... God, he's so stupid. 

"Bellamy?" Clarke’s voice is right outside of the door, and then there's a loud thud of something hitting the door. "Bellamy?"

"Clarke?" Bellamy asks, standing back up.

“Bellamy!” There’s another thud and then a pause and his name called again. Bellamy swallows and tries to clear the way his throat is closing with everything he’s never had a chance to tell Clarke yet. 

"Clarke you need to get out of the hallway, ok? You need-"

There's another loud bang, and then another and Jasper’s voice yelling Clarke's name and Bellamy realizes it's the sound of Clarke throwing herself against the door, trying to break it down. "No, let me go," Clarke snarls. "Let me go Jasper, I need to get him out!"

"Clarke," Bellamy tries again, "you can't break down the door it's reinforced-"

"Shut up, Bellamy," Clarke gasps back and then there's another thud, and another, "I'm not-" thud, "letting you-" thud, "die!"

"Clarke, stop," Jasper begs. And then over the radio, "Guys give me some good news, Clarke's about to brain herself out here."

"Hold on-" Monty radios back, brief and unrevealing and Bellamy hears a strange keening sound in the hallway, almost animal in its fear and and pain. Clarke's body hits the door again.

"I need to-" Clarke's gasping.

"Jasper," Bellamy shouts, pressing his hand against the door as if he could stop Clarke from throwing herself into the steel again, "get Clarke out of here." She shouldn’t have to hear him die. 

"Not all of us are blessed with your upper body strength, Bellamy," Jasper shouts back and there's the sound of a scuffle in the hallway and Clarke swearing, and then Jasper again. "Jesus fuck, Clarke, don't bite me!"

"Bellamy," Clarke's voice is muffled, blurry and warped and Bellamy realizes she's crying. "I'm going to get you out. I need to- I need to-"

"Bellamy," Monty radios suddenly, "Raven can break the lock but it won't hold, you'll only have a few seconds to get out, but it'll trigger the radiation as soon as it relocks. If the door’s not closed, you’ll irradiate the hallway as well. You need to move on my count, can you?"

“He can,” Clarke snaps across the radio. “Of course he can. Do it.”

“Bellamy?” Monty prompts.

"Yes," Bellamy says. "I'm ready."

"Three- two-" Monty counts. "One- Now!"

There's the soft click as the lock comes undone and Bellamy crashes through the door, slams it closed behind him and hears the lock click again and a wail as the alert system notes the radiation released into the room. He barely registers it because Clarke has launched herself at him, hair wild and messy and body shuddering as he catches her weight in his arms.

"Oh my god," she's sobbing, hands touching his arms, his chest, his face, her own so close to his that they're breathing the air. "You're okay, you're okay." She says it like she's trying to reassure them both as her hands map his cheekbones, push his hair back from his forehead and tremble down his neck to circle his shoulders. 

"I'm okay," he affirms, holding her steady, letting her buckle into him. He's never seen this desperation in Clarke before, except once, one time he thought he dreamed up in a moment of weakness with a sword pressed to his neck and Clarke bound next to him like an apparition after three months of absence.

She had begged, then, for his life, and had sounded just like this. He hadn't quite believed it, hadn't thought, after what went down in Polis, that it could have really happened, that she would sound like that for him. But here she is, clinging to him, hands fisted in his shirt, her face pressed into his neck and her tears hot on his skin. Bellamy holds her close to him and sinks back against the wall. He flashes Jasper a weak smile and then drops his head into Clarke’s hair, breathes her in and lets himself feel her, just for a moment. If he can die so easily, if he can lose Clarke so easily, then he gets to be selfish, just for a moment.

“It’s okay,” he whispers again into her hair. “It’s okay, Clarke.”

She nods against him but doesn’t move, other than to smooth her hands down his back, feeling him against her and then fist her hands even tighter into his shirt. They have to keep moving: he hears Monty and Raven on the radio and vaguely hears Jasper deflect a question, his back to them. They have to keep going because the world needs to be saved, but for a moment more, they can have this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	12. Rockets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I knew you’d be here,” Bellamy says, leaning against the doorway of the room Clarke’s secluded herself in. She’s been staring at the maps, at Raven’s scrawled estimations and figures, at the charts Luna brought, going over and over everything. Clarke looks up at him, marking her place with her finger on the page, offers him a little smile. “You alright?”
> 
> “I’m good. Really.”
> 
> “Clarke,” Bellamy says, brusque and sounding a little annoyed, the way he goes when he thinksbeing stupid. She’d never admit it, but it’s a relief that he talks to her like this again, a relief that he challenges her without mincing his words. He’s not afraid of her taking off, not anymore. “We’ve been over those maps and calculations a hundred times already. Raven’s checked and double checked. What more can you possibly do right now?”

“I knew you’d be here,” Bellamy says, leaning against the doorway of the room Clarke’s secluded herself in. She’s been staring at the maps, at Raven’s scrawled estimations and figures, at the charts Luna brought, going over and over everything. Clarke looks up at him, marking her place with her finger on the page, offers him a little smile. “You alright?”

“I’m good. Really.”

“Clarke,” Bellamy says, brusque and sounding a little annoyed, the way he goes when he thinks she’s being stupid. She’d never admit it, but it’s a relief that he talks to her like this again, a relief that he challenges her without mincing his words. He’s not afraid of her taking off, not anymore. “We’ve been over those maps and calculations a hundred times already. Raven’s checked and double checked. What more can you possibly do right now?”

“I’m just making sure…” Clarke starts and trails off. Making sure of what? She’s not sure, but all she can think about is _what if, what if, what if_. It keeps her up at night, drives her back to work when she takes a break. She won’t let her friends down, not again. Bellamy lifts an eyebrow, arms crossed, waiting for her to finish her thought and Clarke just gives him a helpless smile. “I guess I’m just making sure.”

“Yeah,” he says and returns the small smile. “That’s what I thought.” He gets it, Clarke knows that. They’ve walked around Arkadia together, late at night when they’ve found each other awake from nightmares and guilt, found words came easier when the world is hushed. “You need a break. A real one.”

“And do what?” Clarke asks, pushing back from the maps and rubs a hand over her face. She slouches on the stool as she swivels to face Bellamy. “Go out and do that?” 

She gestures vaguely outside to where the noise of drums and small stringed instruments reach them, the sounds of laughter and raised voices, a party in full swing, sparked by Raven’s and Jasper’s cooped up boredom: half a farewell party to Arkadia before they leave tomorrow, in part an excuse to have one last night of fun before they leave the safety of what they know and plunge head first into the uncertainty of survival.

There’s grounder made meade and Luna’s briney salt crackers, Roan’s contribution of honey sweetened wheat cakes and Monty’s fresh batch of moonshine. Clarke had managed to stand about fifteen minutes of it before she retreated here to put her mind at rest.

“Yeah,” Bellamy says. “Exactly that. Get a drink, talk to people, it’s ok to have a little bit of fun.”

Bellamy’s smile, lit by fire, filters back through Clarke’s mind, a memory echoing the last time Bellamy had encouraged her to enjoy herself for a night. _Get a drink_ , he’d said, _have some fun while you still can._ Time for fun is running out. 

“Yeah, ok,” Clarke agrees, pushing herself up. “Ok, but you’re coming with me.” She knows Bellamy’s tricks, knows he has an excuse prepared, his own agenda to keep him busy, but she’s not having it. 

“Clarke,” Bellamy begins to protest but she catches his elbow and pushes. 

“You want me to have fun? You better come make sure. You know I’m a fun flight risk,” she teases him and Bellamy actually laughs.

“You do have a bad habit of that,” he teases right back and Clarke smiles up at him, unoffended, glad they’ve left the bitterness and hurt behind them. 

The party has gotten rowdier since she’d left, Skaikru and Grounders alike intermingling and eating together. There’s some kind of partnered dance that’s sprung up, a reel with repetitive steps that lead couples through turns and twists together, breaking them apart and circling them back to each other again. Abby and Kane are dancing, flushed and laughing with a light heartedness Clarke hasn’t seen in her mother in years, and it makes her chest ache. She spots Monty and Harper as well, weaving through the other dancers, the whip of Octavia’s dark hair and a flash of Miller’s smile.

Clarke takes it all in as she leans back against the steel of the Ark and takes the drink Bellamy presses into her hands. She lets her fingers linger over his as he’s slow to pull his hand away. 

“Remember those parties they’d throw for us on the Ark?” Clarke surprises herself by saying, the memory of the cheesy themes and music brought back by the taste of Monty’s moonshine. “The ones they thought would discourage us from having our own?” 

Bellamy cocks his head down at her, expression just a little wistful. “I wouldn’t know,” he admits with a little chuckle. “I never went to one.”

“What?” Clarke splutters, choking a bit on her drink in genuine shock. “You never went to one? Bellamy, they were a rite of passage: everyone had to suffer through them.”

“Well,” Bellamy says, scuffing his boot in the dirt. “I guess I was lucky to miss them then.” He says it with a little laugh but Clarke hears what he’s not saying. She knows, or is beginning to, how Bellamy withdrew, after Octavia was born. He’d told her bits and pieces about growing up, after she’d found him teaching a game she’d never heard of before to Floukru children, Octavia lingering near by, eyes hungry.

“What game is that?” Clarke had asked her, “It’s not an Ark one.”

“Yes it is,” Octavia had said, surprised. “Bellamy and I used to play it all the time.” She’d stared at Clarke when she’d shaken her head, and then abruptly turned and melted back into the bustle of Arkadia. Clarke had stayed and watched Bellamy show the kids how to toss the little bundles of fabric weighted with stones through twisted hoops of wire, crouched down on their level and showing one little girl how to get the right angle with her wrist.

She knows that when he wasn’t in school or doing odd jobs for extra rations, he was at home with Octavia and his mother. She hears from the omissions about the absence of friends and of the childhood Bellamy had denied himself in order to give Octavia one. 

Clarke remembers, now, how class had always filled with gossip the morning after the dances: who had worn what, who had snuck off with whom, what the worst song played had been. The camaraderie born of how terrible the dances were had always brought together kids from all different stations, crowded around desks to whisper and giggle together. Everyone had a story, everyone got a chance to share. 

It must have been so lonely, she thinks, as she watches Bellamy studying the pattern of the dance now, to not be able to join in. Not just missing the dance, but missing all the bonding after. Clarke reaches out and finds Bellamy’s fingers with her own, takes them.

He glances away from the dancing and smiles at her, easy and gentle, squeezes her right back. “Having fun?”

“Do you want to dance with me?” Clarke asks.

Bellamy looks taken aback, and glances back out at the whirling couples, faster now that a flute has joined in the music, has lifted and carried the melody. “Do you know how to do that dance?”

“Nah,” Clarke says. “But how hard can it be?”

Turns out, it’s kind of hard. Bellamy manages to pick up the steps pretty quickly, has always been a fast, kinetic learner, but Clarke stumbles over them, can’t help but giggle at her own clumsiness. “You’re so bad at this, Clarke,” Bellamy laughs, sounding both amused and a little exasperated. “How are you so bad at this?”

“Because it’s hard,” Clarke protests. “The question is why are you so good at this?”

“It’s not that hard,” Bellamy goads her. “You just have to follow the steps. Or if you would just let me lead…” Clarke giggles again as she stumbles and Bellamy sighs in mock frustration and has to haul her quickly to the right so they avoid another whirling couple. They’re definitely messing up the pattern of the dance, but Clarke couldn’t care less: Bellamy is grinning unselfconsciously as he tries to instruct her where to put her feet, when to step and the fact that she’s focusing on his smile so much means she’s not really listening. 

They stumble through several different reels, other couples learning to give them a wide berth and Bellamy ends up wheezing in laughter with how spectacularly bad Clarke is. “God,” he says as he catches his breath, steadying her with the hand he’s settled on her waist. “If I missed seeing you make a fool of yourself on the Ark, I really would have regretted not going to those dances.”

“Yeah, yeah, well it wasn’t this kind of dancing. I was cool.”

“Yeah right, you?”

Clarke sticks her tongue out at him, can’t keep up the front of being offended as Bellamy just smirks at her again. It’s so easy with him, god, it’s so easy. He makes her feel like it could be worth having hope that they’re going to survive, that their crazy, unlikely plans could succeed and that life is going to keep going. That _they’re_ going to keep going. She realizes she wants that, and it’s scary, to want again, but she does. The way her heart pounds in her chest, she’s not sure if it’s that fear, or the way Bellamy’s smile softens his face and how much she’d like to see him look like that more.

There’s a loud pop and bang and both Bellamy and Clarke jump, tensed for trouble, but it’s just a small rocket that bursts apart in the sky. Clarke hears Raven whoop and Jasper hollering and then another rocket launches, explodes again high above them. 

“I’m going to kill them,” Bellamy mutters, shaking his head, but he’s watching the fall of sparks curiously, even smiles at the next rocket that pops apart blue and green. Clarke shifts a little so her shoulder brushes Bellamy’s and he glances down at her, raises his eyebrows. “Did you approve this?”

“Do you think Raven thinks she needs either of our approval?”

“Fair,” Bellamy mutters. 

Clarke thinks of the last time they watched rockets launch together, Bellamy still a stranger, an antagonist. She looks at him now and has to curl her fingers into her palm at the thought of living her life without him. 

“Did you ever figure it out?” she can’t help but ask. “What you would wish for?”

“Huh,” Bellamy chuckles after a moment, catching up the loose threads of that old, nearly forgotten conversation. “I think I have.”

“Yeah?” Clarke asks.

“Yeah.” He smiles at her. “A partner who can actually dance.”

“You are so full of shit,” Clarke splutters and Bellamy grins at her, pleased at making her laugh. 

“Yeah, sometimes,” he admits. But then he reaches out and takes her hand, the first time he’s taken it without her prompting him too. “But not about you.”

He says it soft and honest, not quite meeting her eyes and Clarke squeezes his hand hard, turns her own so that their fingers interlace. She doesn’t have words, suddenly, but Bellamy, searching her face, seems to get it. He strokes his thumb over her knuckles and holds on to her hand until the last of the rockets have burned out.

Clarke thinks that fear of wanting may just be worth it, if moments like this keep coming.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


	13. Trim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy watches it start

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> season 4 spec'ing around Eliza's short hair.

Bellamy watches it start. 

It’s not a private moment, although he thinks it probably should be, Clarke just hands Abby a pair of shears she’s produced from somewhere, and sits down at the edge of camp. The firelight accentuates her cheekbones and the strange hollowness of her eyes that Bellamy has seen her fight against over the past week; it catches the gold of her hair that hangs down, dreaded but still beautiful, he thinks. When Abby lifts the first gathered lock of it tentatively in her hand, Bellamy knows what’s going to happen and has to look away as his stomach does a funny little roll.

He gets it. He wouldn’t want to fight through the tangled mess that Clarke’s hair became in her sojourn. The week after she left, he had forgotten to shower until Octavia and Lincoln had practically dragged him to the showers and doused him in warm water. After, Octavia had sat behind him and carefully worked out the worst of the snarls in his hair with a comb, like their mother had done for them both when they were still small. And his hair had been short…

Still, Clarke’s hair is one of the last vestiges he feels like he can recognize. Yeah, it’s dreaded and tangled and has dashes of pink he doesn’t get, but it’s _her._ Her clothes, her mannerisms, even her eyes… they’ve all changed in the three months she had been gone, and while he knows Clarke, maybe better sometimes than he wants to admit, understands on a primal level what she’s been through, he struggles to find his balance with her, now that the constant push forward in defeating ALIE is over.

He knows there’s more, knows they’re not done, but he doesn’t know why yet, they haven’t had time to talk privately, and when he’s looked at her, carefully, out of the corner of his eye, surrounded by their friends and strangers alike, Clarke has only pressed her lips together and shaken her head. 

_Not yet_ , she had said. 

But _not yet_ , is all he’s gotten out of her for the past forty-eight hours. He’s getting antsy with it, because he knows Clarke will tell him, knows she’s figuring it out, but he doesn’t want her to have to bear whatever it is they’re now facing alone. He wants her to let him in, because the sooner she does, the sooner it’s _them_ again.

And maybe that’s the crux of it, he thinks as his hands chafe on rain soaked rope and the early spring wind is still biting at his neck, numbing the cuts on his face and the bruises on his body, at once a relief and making him feel stiff and older than he thinks he has a right to at twenty-three. Maybe he’s worried that when her hair goes, she won’t anymore. 

That with her hair, that last trace of the Clarke he knew, the selfish part of him whispers _his_ Clarke, will be gone, and the afterimage of the girl he held onto for three months, the ghost that drove him forward to find her and build a home that would be strong enough to protect them both, will have just been an idol he built up in his head. That this Clarke, hollow-eyed and corset-laced, will have no need of him. 

Bellamy concentrates on the sound of his friends’ laughter and tries not to think about the days back at the dropship, back when he and Clarke were good, the kind of good that feels cocky and foolhardy now because it had yet been untested, still laced with that light question of _when_ , the one offered in the flicker of Unity Day fires. 

They’d sit and share a flask Bellamy had unrepentantly made for himself out of part of a tarp Clarke had set aside for rain collection, and then had bullied Monty to fill up. And while Clarke knew and rolled her eyes, she still had deigned to share it with him.

Back then, as they planned and mentally tallied supplies and Bellamy yelled at the guards he caught goofing off, Clarke had worked her fingers through her hair, untangling small snares as she found them, always frowning down at their schematics, but hands distracted. 

_Jesus,_ Bellamy remembers goading her one night, _you need me to pull your hair back for you, Princess? Because that looks like a pain_.

Clarke’s eyebrows had done that thing, the half lifted twitch, as her lips fought against a smile and yeah, Bellamy had wanted her. _It’s not so bad. Besides, I’ve lived my entire life with it braided up. Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t a little chaos your thing?_

_Showing off your pretty hair is what’s going to fuck you over when the grounders come._

_You think my hair is pretty?_

_Bite me, Clarke._ He remembers chuckling then but looking up and meeting her eyes in the way they were slowly getting used to doing, trust and respect and attraction pulling them together. _You’d be smarter to just hack it all off._

 _Now you want to match with me,_ Clarke had laughed, and god, Bellamy misses that sound. But more than that, she had reached out, the first time they had touched for the sake of touching, and roughly ruffled his hair. He had glared at her from under the hair she had pushed down on his forehead as she had said _I don’t know, Bellamy, you might need a trim yourself, it’s getting pretty long_.

“Bellamy, man, come join us,” Miller calls, and it startles Bellamy from his thoughts. Miller is lounging out by the fire, his head in Bryan’s lap and Harper flopped next to them. Bellamy keeps himself from looking for Octavia. He knows she isn’t there, he knows. It still makes his chest hurt though. 

“I think I’m just going to call it an early night,” Bellamy says. He doesn’t want to tempt fate, doesn’t want to see Clarke with her hair gone and go to sleep even more unsure of where they stand.

“You’re missing out!” Harper shouts at him. “What’s the point of saving the world if you’re going to be an old man and go to bed super early. 

_Because we haven’t. Not yet._

“Yeah, live it up for me,” Bellamy manages and gives them a half hearted wave as they rib him, but ducks into his makeshift lean-to and throws himself down. He wants to sleep and tries to, closes his eyes and evens out his breathing, but the camp starts to go quiet and the firelight dims before he can turn his mind off. Voices go soft, and Bellamy thinks the rest of their band must sleep around him when Clarke’s shadow leaps onto the wall of his canvas tarp. 

“Bellamy?”

Bellamy pushes himself up onto his elbows and doesn’t even think about feigning sleep. “Clarke?”

There’s never been a need for more formal invitation between them and Clarke’s shadow grows bigger, elongates and widens like she’s more than human, grows larger than life and morphs beyond recognition before the flap of the tarp twitches and she’s right there with him, peeking in.

“I was kind of hoping you’d be asleep,” she says softly and she crawls in next to him. Her hair is so short, Bellamy can’t help but stare at it, but more than that, it looks soft and clean and mussed, like she’s washed it since her cut. It fluffs up in some places, is still drying in others and her eyes are as clear as he can remember seeing them. “Aren’t you exhausted?”

“To the bone,” Bellamy admits, but sits up so that Clarke can settle next to him, legs crossed and hands clasped in her lap. She smiles at him faintly, understanding and a little sad, but the most _Clarke_ he’s seen in ages. 

“I can relate,” she says. And then, “I’m sorry, Bellamy. To have kept you in the dark. I needed to… this, I guess,” she says, with a half hearted gesture at her hair, and suddenly Bellamy understands. 

He gets the weight of what they’ve carried, the weight Clarke has borne alone, how the heaviness of her guilt and loneliness worked it’s way into her tangled and dirtied hair; how it’s taken on it’s own symbolism and meaning and Clarke hasn’t been able to escape it as much as she’s tried. She shakes her head and looks at once sheepish and worried as she looks up at him, god, so much like the girl of eighteen that she deserves to be. “Well, it’s an adjustment anyway.”

“It looks good,” Bellamy says before he can stop himself and doesn’t even think about it as he reaches out and ruffle her hair. “You trying to match with me Clarke?”

Clarke is still under his hand but when he can’t help brushing her hair back behind her ear, Clarke is looking at him with such relief that it hurts. He smiles at her, as much as he can without it hurting, or past that, a bit, just so the skin starts to pull on his cheeks, and withdraws his hand. 

“Bellamy,” Clarke says softly, her relief going a little pained. “I want to be done. You know? I want all of this to be done and I want…” she stops and shakes her head, eyes flickering down at her hands before she looks at him again. “I’m so sorry,” she says quietly.

“Whatever is, Clarke,” Bellamy tells her, “whatever is, I’m here, ok?”

“I know you are,” Clarke says, and god, it’s still her. It’s Clarke and she’s still hisand he’s still hers, and he was wrong. She hasn’t moved beyond his reach, she’s moved toward him. 

She takes a breath, and she tells him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> .

**Author's Note:**

> [Here I am](http://verbam.tumblr.com/)  
>   
> 
> Comments and kudos brighten my day :)


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